The Asian CSR Awards

The Asian CSR Awards

THE ASIAN CSR AWARDS recognizes organizations for embodying the principles of corporate responsibility in their business philosophy and operations. Awards are given for programs that achieve excellence in terms of services to stakeholders and innovative sustainable solutions to pressing social challenges.

Awardees should demonstrate the company’s leadership, sincerity and on-going commitment to incorporating ethical values, compliance with legal requirements, respect for individuals, involvement in communities and protection of the environment into the way they do business. The Awards categories are as follows: Environmental Excellence, Education Improvement, Poverty Alleviation, and Health Enhancement. In addition, the Awards Committee may choose to recognize a particular program with a CSR Impact Award. The CSR Impact Award honors a program that has an on-going track record of significant sustainable impact and is innovative and replicable. It may be a combination of other categories stated earlier.

THE INTEL – ASIAN INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY AWARD (IACRA) continues to recognize companies in that have embedded CSR into its operations and integrated CSR into its business. These companies should demonstrate that they are actively promoting CSR to both their internal and external stakeholders. The IACRA is not an award for a specific initiative or a single area.

The main criterion is that the organization has made CSR an integral part of the way they do business and has implemented CSR projects or programs that have a significant impact and are sustainable in all appropriate areas of operations. Furthermore, these companies should represent role models and exert positive influences on their stakeholders, their peers and their communities.

Now on its 13th year, the Asian CSR Awards program is presented by the Ramon V. del Rosario, Sr. Center for Corporate Social Responsibility, a research and program center within the Asian Institute of Management (AIM). It is the Center’s belief that CSR can be truly sustainable only when it is integrated into the company’s business model and is regarded as fundamental to strategy.

The Awards ceremonies will be held during the Gala Dinner and Awards Night of the 2015 Asian Forum on Corporate Social Responsibility in Bangkok, Thailand on 9 September 2015.

If you are interested to participate in the awards program , contact our Awards Coordinator, Ms. Necy Gacilo at Email: awards.afcsr@aim.edu| Phone: (632) 720-2100 (local 2614) | Fax: (632) 752-1208

ASIAN CSR AWARDS ENTRY GUIDELINES

Who are eligible to participate for the Asian CSR Program Awards?

Organizations operating in Asia are eligible to submit entries for the Asian CSR Program Awards. Eligible applicants include private companies, non-profit organizations, social enterprises and state-owned companies. Conglomerates and their subsidiaries can submit separate entries as long as they submit information on the strategies and programs relative to their operations.

Any organization with a significant presence in Asia may submit entries. This includes organizations with headquarters within the Asia-Pacific region as well as those with headquarters in other regions but who have significant operations in Asia.     

There is no limit to the number of programs submitted per company. Submit one entry form per program. No entry/processing fee is required.

What is the Asian CSR Awards Program?

The Asian CSR Program Awards recognize outstanding social and environmental initiatives of organizations. Entries will be evaluated based on how well the program, project, or service is implemented, its innovativeness, its replicability, its sustainability and the character and magnitude of its impact.

What are the categories of this year’s Asian CSR Awards?

  • Education Improvement: This category acknowledges initiatives that promote education through capacity building or skills training of employees, community and other stakeholders. These initiatives may address the following issues: illiteracy; drop-out rates; women inclusion in education and technology; access to education; development of higher level of skills and capabilities; improvement of educational infrastructure, facilities and technologies; promotion of teacher-training; and promotion of academic learning through partnerships.
  • Environmental Excellence: This category acknowledges initiatives that focus on protecting and nurturing the environment. These initiatives may address the following issues: value chain management; management of environmental footprint; prevention of pollution; sustainable resource use; climate change mitigation and adaptation; and protection of the environment and biodiversity.
  • Poverty Alleviation: This category acknowledges initiatives that promote livelihood and income-generation through community engagement. It also includes initiatives to include women and children in development; employment creation and skills training; improving access to technology; and supporting entrepreneurship.
  • Health Enhancement: This category acknowledges initiatives that focus on improvement in health care availability and/or quality, or health status in the local, national or international environments. These initiatives may include: reduction of malnutrition; support of medical research into areas that are meaningful to and of importance to the immediate community; and creating partnerships with NGOs, governmental agencies or others to provide health care to marginalized members of society.
  • CSR Special Impact Award: The award recognizes outstanding programs that can demonstrate an on-going track record of significant sustainable impact that are clearly innovative, replicable and scalable.  The program under this category does not have to fall under the other categories. The outstanding program must be making a substantive and continuing difference well above the other CSR initiatives of the company.

Overall Criteria

For 2015, the overall criteria of the Asian CSR Award are focused on: impact; innovation; replicability and scalability.

  • Program Impact refers to the degree and scope of the program’s success in addressing the identified social need or concern. Impact refers to the qualitative and quantitative outcomes of the program. Criteria guide questions are: How has the program changed the lives of the beneficiaries? What is the long-term impact of the program? How sustainable is their impact? What factors contribute to sustainability?
  • Innovation refers to the adoption of new strategies or initiatives that seek to address the social need or concern. Innovation refers to “out-of-the-box” thinking and adoption of approaches that have not been widely implemented.   Criteria guide questions are: Is it a new approach? Has this been applied by other companies? What are the improvements of the program? How different is the program from others?
  • Replicability refers to the potential of the program to stimulate other players to undertake their own innovation or provide examples of best practice. Replicability establishes the effectiveness of a program model by demonstrating that it can be successfully implemented, and achieve consistent outcome in new locations. Criteria guide questions are: How much documentation is available to aid in replicating the program? Has the program been implemented or are there plans in replicating the program in other sites/locations?  
  • Scalability refers to the potential of the program to be scaled up in order to reach large numbers of the target group. Criteria guide questions are: Are there any plans to scale-up the program? How many people could benefit from the program if it was successfully scaled-up?

Judges Corner

The Asian CSR Awards entry form will be evaluated by a team of CSR professionals (i.e. academics, consultants, and practitioners) who are also the partners of and selected experts from the Asian Forum on Corporate Social Responsibility (AFCSR).

The judges will be divided into five (5) teams, one per category. Each team will select the winners for the Best Program per category and the CSR Impact Award. The judging teams will review the entries. These will be submitted to the chairperson appointed for each team. The chairperson will then submit a final recommendation to the conference committee.

If two companies are equally meritorious, an award may be given to two companies as joint winners. On the other hand, if there are no exceptional entries submitted in any category, the Board of Judges is not committed to give any award.

The Entry Form

Fill in the accompanying ENTRY FORM (together with the attached Verification Form) and submit via email to awards.afcsr@aim.edu on or before 22 May 2015, Friday.

Participating companies need to submit one entry form per program.

ONLY entries that are accompanied by the Verification Form, which is signed as true and correct by the CEO/President or the most senior person in charge of Asian Operations of an overseas organization will be entertained. Participating organization must also disclose any pending issues or criminal/ civil cases.

INCOMPLETE forms shall not be evaluated.

Non-Disclosure & Confidentiality

The Asian CSR Awards will ensure that applications will only be available to the Organizers, Judges and Steering Committee of the Asian CSR Awards.

In line with the AIM-RVR CSR Center’s mission to promote CSR best practice in the business sector in Asia, the non-financial information included in the entry form will be part of the RVR database, which will be used in the development of academic articles, teaching materials and other publications. The AIM-RVR CSR Center will have ownership of the evaluation reports (full and summary) as well as the research materials developed based on the entry forms.

For inquiries, please contact:
The Asian CSR Awards Steering Committee c/o AIM RVR Center
Attention: Ms. Necy Gacilo, Awards Coordinator
123 Paseo de Roxas, 1260 Makati City Philippines
Phone: (632) 720-2100 (local 2614) | Fax: (632) 752-1208 | Email: awards.afcsr@aim.edu

IACRA ENTRY GUIDELINES

Who are eligible to participate for the Asian CSR Program Awards?

Applicants eligible to submit entries are private companies and state-owned companies. Conglomerates and their subsidiaries can submit separate entries as long as they submit information on the strategies and programs relative to their operations.

Applicants for the IACRA should have corporate headquarters within the Asia-Pacific region as well as those with headquarters in other regions but who have significant operations in Asia.
A previous winner can submit an entry as long as there is a significant change and development in its CSR strategy or program relative to the previous submission. 

What is IACRA?

The IACRA is a company award that recognizes: (1) the company’s approach in embedding CSR into its business and integrating CSR into its organization; and (2) the company’s strategies in promoting CSR to its internal and external stakeholders.

The Winners Circle

There will only be one winner of the IACRA.

Overall Criteria

The main criteria is that the organization  has made CSR an integral part of the way they do business and has implemented interesting innovative CSR projects or programs that have an impact and are sustainable. Furthermore, these companies should represent role models and exert positive influences on their stakeholders, their peers and their community. IACRA recognizes a company or organization, not a specific CSR project or program.  

Judges Corner

The IACRA entry form will be evaluated by a team of CSR professionals (i.e. academics, consultants and practitioners) who are also the partners of and selected experts from the Asian Forum on Corporate Social Responsibility (AFCSR).

Representatives from AFCSR (the co-chairs), AIM, Intel, an internationally known advocate, and one or two regional NGOs form the IACRA Selection Committee. The IACRA Selection Committee is usually comprised of five to seven members.
There will only be one winner. If there are no exceptional companies, the IACRA Selection Committee is not committed to give an award.

The Entry Form

Fill in the IACRA ENTRY FORM (together with the Verification Form) and submit via email to awards.afcsr@aim.edu on or before 22 May 2015, Friday.

Participating companies need to submit only one entry form for the IACRA.

ONLY entries that are accompanied by the Verification Form, which is signed as true and correct by the CEO/ President of Asian business organizations or the most senior person in charge of Asian Operations of an overseas multinational will be entertained. Participating companies must also disclose any pending issues or criminal/civil cases.

INCOMPLETE forms shall not be evaluated.

Non-Disclosure & Confidentiality

The IACRA Steering Committee will ensure that applications and information therein will only be available to the Organizers, Judges and Steering Committee of the Asian CSR Awards.

All financial information will be kept confidential, unless specifically allowed by the company or already publicly available.

In line with the AIM-RVR CSR Center’s mission to promote CSR best practice in the business sector in Asia, the information included in the entry form will be part of the RVR Center database, which will be used in the development of case research materials. The AIM-RVR CSR Center will have ownership of the research materials developed based on the entry forms.

For inquiries, please contact:
The Asian CSR Awards Steering Committee c/o AIM RVR Center
Attention: Ms. Necy Gacilo, Awards Coordinator
123 Paseo de Roxas, 1260 Makati City Philippines
Phone: (632) 720-1010 (local 2614) | Fax: (632) 752-1208 | Email: awards.afcsr@aim.edu